


A Sparring Session

by celluloidbroomcloset



Category: The Avengers (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-17
Updated: 2015-03-17
Packaged: 2018-03-18 09:28:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3564638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celluloidbroomcloset/pseuds/celluloidbroomcloset
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Intended to come after "The Teddy Bear." Steed and Emma have a wrestling match that turns...interesting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Sparring Session

He had her hands pinned down, one on either side of her head.

“Your move, Mrs. Peel,” he said. 

The bastard was enjoying this. Steed's grip was spectacularly strong. He grinned. A single errant curl had fallen down over his forehead, adding to the whole, rather distracting effect of him pinning her to the floor. Emma tried to concentrate on what she needed to do and not on the twinge of arousal. 

She knew she could not best him in strength, but then strength had little to do with effective martial arts. Concentration, balance, integrity of movement – these were the keys. All the better when your opponent thinks he has the better of you. Steed was already slightly off-balance, having to lean forward to hold her. She raised one hip, using his own weight against him as she bucked up, turning her body in a smooth motion. He flipped over onto his back and then she had his arm in a lock, one leg pressing down set to break it.

“Your move, Steed.”

He had none. One false start and his arm would snap. Steed tapped the mat with his other hand.

“I concede,” he shouted.

She let him go.

Steed stood up to his full height, shaking his arm and twisting his neck around. He didn’t look angry; he never looked angry when she bested him. He gave her a glance, half of respect and half, she could tell, of badly concealed arousal. She watched him from her place on the mat as he went over to the drinks board in the corner of the room.

John Steed was an attractive man. Tall, well-built, broad-shouldered, he wore his impeccably tailored clothes well. In his sleeves and without his coat – but still sporting the slender dark blue silk tie that matched his dark blue suit – he was even more attractive. He moved with economy, a man wholly connected to his body, aware of it and in control of it. She’d been held by him enough times, both on the mat and off it, to recognize the curbed strength in his body.

But wasn’t it more than that? Physically attractive, yes, and powerfully so, but she’d known plenty of big, handsome men in her life. None of them affected her the way John Steed did. She’d never felt the same kind of attraction, not even with Peter. The more she knew of Steed, the more she felt bound to him with an invisible lead. Their relationship had been a constant push and pull of wills, of teasing and flirtation, of mutual challenge. But it was not really a fight; it was a dance.

When he kissed her for the first time, it did nothing to alleviate the tension. The kiss increased it, in the most pleasurable way possible. Now every touch, every caress, every long, languorous moment on his couch or on hers was a promise of greater pleasures to come. No, she had never known anything like it and was never likely to again. 

He suggested several times, at the end of a charming evening, that she stay the night. She’d declined each offer, frightened of the tension between them relaxing, or worse, of one being disappointed with the other. Maddeningly, he never took it badly, or played the hurt, childish games of some other men. He would rise and guide her to the door, or drop her at her flat, kiss her goodnight and let her go. Perhaps it was that he knew, as well as she did, that they would come to that point sooner or later and did not want to rush it. What she suspected lay in the back of it, though, was the simple fact that John Steed was a gentleman to the very core. He would never pressure a lady. 

“Where are you?” Steed stood above her with a brandy in one hand.

“Here, mostly.”

Rising, she took the glass from him and sat down on his couch. He kicked the mat on the floor into a ball and tossed it into his bedroom, then shut the door and returned to her.

He sat down in the chair opposite her, smiling, his brandy poised in one hand.

“You’re not here. You’re miles away. Come back to me, Mrs. Peel!”

She laughed. The ‘Mrs. Peel’, which she told him numerous times was not necessary, now seemed a fundamental part of the way he spoke. The few times he’d called her Emma – always in a deep-throated whisper against her neck that sent shivers down her spine – it seemed the most intimate thing he could have said or done. She wondered if he planned it like that. She wondered if he planned any of this or if he was as caught up as she was.

He stretched his arm and neck again, grimacing slightly.

“Did I hurt you?” she asked.

“I’ll be a bit sore tomorrow. All in a day’s work, you know.”

“I think sometimes that you rather enjoy it.”

Steed flashed a grin. “I might.”

“Oh, I’m tired,” she said, yawning and stretching, perhaps a little theatrically.

She regarded her work-out clothes – comfortable tan trousers and a white cotton t-shirt.

“I’ll go home and get changed before tonight."

His brow creased just a little – a tiny dip in the middle of his forehead that she thought quite boyish.

“You needn’t, you know. I was just planning on cooking you dinner here. No one to impress but me.”

“I’m not exactly dressed for fine dining.”

He rose and sat down beside her, his arm stretched on the sofa behind her.

“You look lovely to me.”

He kissed her. He was an excellent kisser – forceful without being aggressive, attentive without any hint of impropriety. He kept his hand on her waist, the other gently caressing her jaw. The splayed fingers on her abdomen were almost more intimate than if they’d moved higher. Almost. She was palpably aware of his control, and that too was exciting. Then she slowly became aware of nothing at all, except the feel of his mouth on hers, his smooth shaven face, his breath, his taste.

He broke away to kiss the pulse on her neck, his hand sliding up into her hair as she held on to his shoulders, reveling in the feeling of him against her. She could practically feel his heart beating.

Then, without much thinking what she did, she moved the hand on her abdomen up until it came to rest on her breast.

It was a catalyst and she knew it. Steed drew back, his eyes an open question. She held his hand against her and returned his gaze, answering. 

The next kiss was far deeper, more demanding. His tongue fought with hers and she fought back, wanting to fall into him, be absorbed by him, and yet also resist the impulse. The hand now on her breast teased her through far too many layers of fabric. She slid her hand down his torso and felt the silk of his shirt and hard body beneath. She wanted him; she wanted finally to live out every fantasy she’d fallen asleep to the nights after she left him. She wanted to know what those immaculate clothes concealed, and how he would feel against her, on top of her, inside her. If he had been waiting for her to say yes, then she would. 

“Steed,” she whispered in his ear. “Take me to bed.”

He did not need to be asked twice. They rose almost simultaneously together, and crossed the room, barely separating, tripping over each other in their haste. He drew her into his bedroom and closed the door.

It was still early afternoon, the sun streamed in through the open curtains. Letting go of her, he crossed the room and drew the curtains, shutting out the world. Then he turned back and in the dim light she could see his face as he looked at her, the undisguised desire. She’d barely noticed the bed, the room, the bookshelves or the desk or the sporting implements in the corner. She saw only him, a man as enthralled by her as she was by him. It was flattering and arousing and terrifying. Steed crossed the room rapidly and took her back in his arms.

He drew her thin cotton top over her head and pressed his lips against hers as his hands ran over her breasts, still covered by the lace of her bra. She worked the buttons on his shirt and waistcoat as quickly as she could.

"You men and your buttons," she said and his chest shook when he chuckled.

She finally bared his chest, untucking his shirt from his trousers. She took a moment to look at the slender muscles and the diamond of dark hair that led into a trail down to his waistband and below, the bulge in his trousers that spoke of very definite male excitement. He pressed a kiss to her forehead and she looked up at him, into smiling, honest grey eyes with just a tinge of sadness, world-weariness at their edges. She reached up and kissed him, her hand sweeping over his chest, rubbing against him and drawing a growl that deeply aroused her.

Then they were on the bed, a rough tangle of limbs as eager hands stripped away the rest of their clothing. His hand slid between her legs, touching her through the thin cotton of her underwear. She breathed hard against his shoulder, trying to concentrate on touching him but lost in the sensations that his mouth and hands were creating all over her body. She could feel him, hard against her thigh, and immediately felt impatient, desperate to have him inside of her. The fingers dancing over her were far from enough. 

She drew his briefs down over his hips, and brushed her hand over his erection. He reacted as though she’d struck him, emitting a sharp, desperate noise as she stroked him. Her movement seemed to drive him over the edge. He raised up and drew her underwear down and she raised her hips enough to help him. Then he returned his hand between her legs.

Emma considered herself a woman of the world, as much as any of her generation. But her sexual experiences had, she knew, been limited to a handful of men, none of them – including Peter - particularly creative in their lovemaking. Peter had been very loving but almost utilitarian; she'd loved him deeply, but the most she could say for him was that he was a pleasant lover.

Steed was not a pleasant lover. He was a great deal more and she was beginning to recognize that. He slid two fingers inside of her, his thumb rubbing lightly over her clitoris so that little shots of white heat surged up her body at that point of contact. Peter had never even tried this; his idea of foreplay was a few kisses and turning down the bed. Steed moved his hand up and down, his fingers clever and dexterous. Emma heard herself making noises she'd never made before.

It was too much. It wasn’t enough. When she managed to open her eyes, she saw him looking down at her with a smile as she writhed and moaned under his ministrations. 

“You’re a sadist,” she managed to say. He thrust deeper, making her buck.

“I wouldn’t quite call this sadistic,” he replied.

“You’d better be working up to something.”

“Oh, I am.”

He kept his hand where it was and curved his head down to her breasts, kissing first one and then the other, teasing the nipples with his tongue and teeth until she was certain that she could not stand it any longer. She held his head against her and scraped her nails up and down his neck to touch that oddly erogenous zone she had discovered early on in their relationship. With each scrape of her nails, his hand thrust up, and she felt his rumbling groan against her skin to match her own.

“Now, Steed." She could not have cared less if she was begging. “Now.”

He drew back, slipping his fingers out of her.

“Do we need…?”

She shook her head. “The pill.”

“I adore modern technology.”

She raised her mouth to his and opened her legs for him, wrapping them around his lower body. He filled her. He was big, bigger than Peter had been, and seemed to fit her as perfectly as if he had been made for her and she for him.

She lost track of time. It could have lasted a few minutes, or hours. It seemed to last for hours, the slow, long thrusts, the white electricity that danced across, around, inside her; the increasing tension, wonderful, almost frightening in its intensity. His moans increased, her name rumbled from his throat as he sped up his strokes, short, fast, but wonderfully deep. She wanted him deeper and he obliged her wordless demand when she thrust up at him. He matched her, perfectly. He seemed to know instinctively what to do to bring her far far beyond anything she had thought of as orgasm. It crashed through her, crushed her, separated her, brought her gloriously outside of herself even as it made her acutely aware of her body. She came, trembling, bucking, crying out, contracting against him. She was dimly aware of his orgasm, of his cries and his arms holding her impossibly tight, his body spasming against hers, and his voice crying out her name as though she was all that held him together. 

She was not truly back on earth until she found herself wrapped against him beneath the sheet. They lay together, again she did not know how long, until breathing slowed and calmness returned. A strange new comfort made itself known to her, pressed as she was against Steed. She looked at the clock. It was barely three.

“Shocking,” she murmured.

Steed shifted and she realized that he'd been half asleep. He looked down at her. “Really? Did you not like it?”

“Hmm? Oh, no, not that. It’s three o’clock.”

“Oh, that. Good. I thought I had misread something.”

Emma could not suppress a sigh. “No, indeed.”

She yawned, suddenly, pleasantly tired. Steed chuckled.

“Hold on a bit. I’ll be right back.”

He scrambled out of bed and tossed on his dressing gown, giving her a brief but tantalizing glimpse of his whole powerful body as he did so. She mentally made a note that the next time she would insist on waiting until she had a good, long look at him. 

Steed was not gone long, just long enough for her to rearrange the blankets to a state of near normalcy. He returned bearing a bottle of champagne and two glasses.

She laughed. “Celebrating something?”

“I always keep a bottle or two handy." He climbed into bed next to her.

“For just such eventualities?”

He popped the cork. “Now how do you expect me to respond to that?"

He poured out two glasses. "To you, Emma."

He sipped a little and then said, in a matter-of-fact tone that entirely caught her off-guard:

"In case you were wondering, I have not been seeing anyone else.”

Her eyebrows went up. He was not looking at her but at the champagne, his brow furrowed as though studying the bubbles for answers. She looked into her glass.

“Neither have I,” she said, quietly.

"Ah." He said. "Good. Excellent vintage, wouldn't you say?"

That was all they said. There were other no promises, no questions, no excuses. 

He slid back against the headboard and put his arm around her.

“I’ll cook us dinner tonight. Beef bourguignon and a good vintage Chianti.”

“Mmm.” She cuddled against his chest, smelling the combination of his cologne and aftershave and that delightful masculine scent that was his alone. “Sounds delicious.”

“It will be.” His hand stroked her arm. “And then we can have another sparring session.”

She yawned. “Be careful. I might get used to this.”

“I’m counting on it,” he whispered. 

So, for that matter, was she.


End file.
